ReadWrite - cartoonshttp://readwrite.com/tag/cartoons
enCopyright 2015 Wearable World Inc.http://blogs.law.harvard.edu/tech/rssTue, 31 Mar 2015 15:02:34 -0700Surprise! Now There's A Charlie Hebdo App In Apple's App Store And Google Play<!-- tml-version="2" --><div tml-image="ci01c4fdf860019512" tml-image-caption="" tml-render-layout="inline"><figure><img src="http://a3.files.readwrite.com/image/upload/c_fill,cs_srgb,dpr_1.0,q_80,w_620/MTI3NTA1OTMxNjAzODU1Mzcw.jpg" /><figcaption></figcaption></figure></div><p>Five years after the staff of Charlie Hebdo gave up on the idea of submitting an app to Apple due to its notoriously restrictive approval process for political and controversial content, the French satirical magazine now has one live in <a href="https://itunes.apple.com/us/app/charlie-hebdo./id957966299">the App Store</a>, as well at <a href="https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=fr.charliehebdo.journal">Google Play</a>.</p><p>What a difference a bunch of dead cartoonists makes.</p><p>Last week, <a href="http://readwrite.com/2015/01/13/apple-app-charlie-hebdo-mark-fiore-cartoons">Apple approved a "Je Suis Charlie" geo-tracking app</a> for people who want to show their support for free expression in the wake of the massacre at the publication's office in Paris.</p><p>"Contrary to what you thought would happen if Charlie Hebdo was to submit its app, it did get approved," a spokesperson from Le Monde, the French daily newspaper which built the app, said. </p><p>Groupe Le Monde, which owns Le Monde, is one of several media outlets in France to offer material support to Charlie Hebdo following the January 7 terrorist attack, which left 10 staff members dead. Along with with the daily newspaper Libération, Radio France and France Televisions, Groupe Le Monde volunteered staff and equipment to ensure Charlie Hebdo's continued publication. </p><p>As part of that support, Le Monde's mobile team began building the Charlie Hebdo app the day after the massacre. They wanted to have the app available for download on Friday, the day the first post-shooting issue of Charlie Hebdo hit the newsstands, the spokesperson told ReadWrite. Now, anyone unable to find a print copy of Charlie Hebdo's 7 &nbsp;million-issue run (up from its standard 60,000) can download the app in both the Apple App Store and Google Play. </p><p>The Charlie Hebdo app is free to download, but you have to make a $2.99 in-app purchase in order to access the latest issue, or shell out $89.99 for a year's subscription. The latest issue is available in English and Spanish as well as French. But Anglophones and Hispanophones take note: future issues will be only appear in French.</p><p>According to Le Monde's spokesperson, time limitations proved the greatest obstacle in getting the Charlie Hebdo app on the market. "We needed to build the app, to translate all the content to Spanish and in English, and hurry a way to display the translations," he told ReadWrite. "Second, we needed to get the proper documents from Charlie's survivors to open the official accounts, and as you can guess they were mourning their loss, working on the survivor's issue, dealing with the press."</p><p>Despite Charlie Hebdo's caustic content, receiving Apple's approval for the app was not a problem. "Apple and Google both have been very kind and helpful and of course they never asked to limit the content in any way," the spokesperson told ReadWrite. </p><p>Even the cover of Charlie Hebdo's latest edition, which depicts the prophet Muhammad holding a "Je Suis Charlie" sign while shedding a tear, appears in the App Store. Depicting Muhammad's image—something that Charlie Hebdo does regularly—is considered heretical to some Muslims. </p><p>The necessity of making an in-app purchase to access Charlie Hebdo's content may provide Apple with enough comfortable distance to approve the free app. Regardless, it's a dramatic change for Apple, which rejected comparatively tame <a href="http://readwrite.com/2015/01/13/apple-app-charlie-hebdo-mark-fiore-cartoons">American political cartoonist Mark Fiore's animation app in 2009</a>. According to Apple's rejection letter at the time,&nbsp;Fiore's offending images included&nbsp;cartoons that criticized torture and White House party crashers. It wasn't until 2010, when Fiore won the Pulitzer Prize, that Apple relented. </p><p>An onslaught of customer complaints following Fiore's rejection also led to changes in Apple's rules, which now allow apps that feature ridicule of public figures and the like. Apple's difficult relationship with satire remained an issue, however. In 2013, the App Store rejected the iOS game Sweat Shop, which dealt with the conditions in Third World factories. </p><p>Whether the Charlie Hebdo app is an aberration greenlighted in the aftermath of a horrifying tragedy, or this marks a real change to Apple's App Store and iTunes restrictions, remains to be seen.&nbsp;</p><p><em>Lead image courtesy&nbsp;<a href="https://www.flickr.com/photos/valentinacala/16038033640">Valentina Calà</a></em><a href="https://www.flickr.com/photos/valentinacala/"></a></p>They've even included the latest issue's controversial cover.http://readwrite.com/2015/01/19/charlie-hebdo-apple-app-store
http://readwrite.com/2015/01/19/charlie-hebdo-apple-app-storeMobileMon, 19 Jan 2015 07:54:09 -0800Helen A.S. PopkinApple Supports Charlie Hebdo And Free Speech, Just Not In Its App Store<!-- tml-version="2" --><div tml-image="ci01c482f5c001c80a" tml-image-caption="" tml-render-layout="inline"><figure><img src="http://a3.files.readwrite.com/image/upload/c_fill,cs_srgb,w_620/MTI3MzcwNjgwOTM2MTgwMzU1.png" /><figcaption></figcaption></figure></div><p>In what is likely the fastest App Store approval in iOS history, Apple took only one hour to greenlight an app that promotes a free speech campaign for <em>Charlie Hebdo</em>. Of course, Apple would never have approved an actual&nbsp;<em>Charlie Hebdo</em>&nbsp;app had the caustic—even scabrous—French magazine ever submitted one. (Which it apparently <a href="https://www.bakchich.info/m%C3%A9dias/2010/09/01/apple-desespere-charlie-hebdo-58479">considered back in 2010</a> before learning of Apple's restrictions and telling the company to "get lost.") Like much of Silicon Valley, Apple is far more committed to the idea of free speech than it is to its actual practice.</p><p><a href="https://itunes.apple.com/us/app/id957141390?mt=8">The<em>&nbsp;</em>"Je suis Charlie!"&nbsp;app</a><a href="https://itunes.apple.com/us/app/id957141390?mt=8"></a>&nbsp;supports the <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Je_suis_Charlie">Je Suis Charlie free speech campaign</a>&nbsp;and&nbsp;<em>Charlie Hebdo</em>, which lost 10 staffers in a terrorist attack at its Paris office last week. The order to expedite review of &nbsp;"Je suis Charlie!"&nbsp;came courtesy of Apple CEO Tim Cook, <a href="http://9to5mac.com/2015/01/12/je-suis-charlie-app/">9 to 5 Mac reports</a>. Cook's assistant responded to an email from Nice-Matin, the French news agency that submitted the app, 10 minutes after it was sent.</p><h2>Free Speech For Me But Not For Thee</h2><p>No one should begrudge "Je suis Charlie!"&nbsp;its fast-tracking, even though typical app review takes 10 days or longer. Prospective iOS apps connected to tragedy and the support of free speech are rare events, fortunately.</p><p>Pulitzer Prize-winning political cartoonist Mark Fiore,&nbsp;for instance—whose own app was <a href="http://www.nytimes.com/2010/04/17/books/17cartoonist.html">famously rejected by Apple in 2009</a>—has no problem with the speedy approval of&nbsp;"Je suis Charlie!"&nbsp;He&nbsp;does, however, see some tension in the fact that Apple fast-tracked an app intended to express support of cartoonists whose work would never have cleared App Store guidelines.&nbsp;</p><p>"I’m glad they approved this app so quickly," Fiore told ReadWrite. "What makes my skin crawl is that most of the stuff&nbsp;<em>Charlie Hebdo</em> does, Apple wouldn't approve."</p><blockquote><p><strong>See also:&nbsp;<a href="http://readwrite.com/2015/01/09/facebook-loyalty-pew-internet-study-social-media">Facebook's Got Us On Lockdown, Study Confirms</a></strong></p></blockquote><p>Fiore,&nbsp;whose work is comparatively tame to the majority of Charlie Hebdo's catalog, ran up against Apple's licensing agreement in 2009. At that time, Apple guidelines stated it would reject apps apps which&nbsp;“may be found objectionable, for example, materials that may be considered obscene, pornographic or defamatory.”</p><p>According to his Apple rejection letter, the offending content on Fiore's app included political cartoons that referenced torture and White House party crashers. It wasn't until Fiore became the first online-only political cartoonist to win the Pulitzer in 2010 that the Apple App Store had a change of heart. In the ultimate Apple mea culpa, then-CEO Steve Jobs reportedly responded to one of the many customer complaint about Fiore's App Store rejection.&nbsp;“This was a mistake that’s being fixed,” Jobs wrote from his own&nbsp;email account.</p><p>In the wake of his Pulitzer win, Fiore said, "I received this Deep Throat-sort of phone call from Apple." The voice the other side of the phone told him, "you might want to reconsider resubmitting this app and give us a call when you do." Which he did.&nbsp;</p><h2>Speed When It Counts (For Apple)</h2><p>The speediness with which Fiore's second submission hit the App Store illustrates how quickly a giant company can make things happen once publicity is involved. Fiore made the call to let Apple know. Within two keystrokes Fiore overheard on the phone, his app hit the App Store. "It was pretty much an instantaneous thing," he said.</p><p>The bad PR led to&nbsp;<a href="http://www.engadget.com/2010/09/09/apples-app-store-review-guidelines-we-dont-need-any-more-far/">an update of Apple's rules</a>, which now allow for political content and lampooning public figures, but still reflect some subjective sensitivity concerning satire. <a href="http://techland.time.com/2013/03/22/apples-wrongheaded-dangerous-censorship-of-satirical-sweatshop-for-ipad/">Time reported in 2013</a>&nbsp;that&nbsp;Apple yanked the iOS&nbsp;game Sweatshop from the App Store. The developer describes as "lighthearted"&nbsp;but also “based upon very present realities that many workers around the world contend with each day.”</p><p>"It’s the idea that a game intended both as educational and intelligently satirical could wind up banned that’s dangerous," Time's Matt Peckham wrote.&nbsp;</p><p>Apple isn't the only Silicon Valley behemoth to <a href="http://www.slate.com/blogs/future_tense/2015/01/09/charlie_hebdo_support_from_twitter_facebook_apple_others_sends_a_mixed_message.html">embrace&nbsp;<em>Charlie Hebdo</em> in the abstract</a>.&nbsp;Twitter's French unit displayed a #JeSuisCharlie banner on its Twitter profile, while Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg <a href="https://www.facebook.com/zuck/posts/10101851078206231">wrote in a tribute post</a> that "different voices—even if they’re sometimes offensive—can make the world a better and more interesting place.” Both social networks, of course, have a <a href="http://readwrite.com/2014/05/27/twitter-pakistan-russia-blocked-tweets">documented</a> <a href="https://govtrequests.facebook.com/">history</a> of <a href="https://transparency.twitter.com/removal-requests/2014/jan-jun">censorship</a>. It's the price of building a business in countries where free speech is not a priority.</p><p>Google, too, is getting headlines for <a href="http://9to5google.com/2015/01/09/charlie-hebdo-google/">contributing $300,000</a> toward 1 million copies of <a href="http://www.bbc.com/news/world-europe-30790409">Tuesday's Charlie Hebdo edition</a>. But that cash isn't coming from the goodness of Google's heart, or even its couch cushions. It's part of a <a href="http://www.theguardian.com/technology/2013/feb/01/google-52m-fund-help-french-publishers">$70 million fund Google agreed to set up</a>&nbsp;for French publishers two years ago as part of a settlement with the government over advertising loss. "It's good that (Charlie Hebdo) got the money, but it's good PR for Google, too," Fiore says.&nbsp;</p><p>As for Apple, Fiore says, "They show their support, 'We're all for free speech!' But would you run these cartoons? Uh, no."&nbsp;</p><p>Apple did not return ReadWrite's request for comment.&nbsp;</p>Silicon Valley is committed to the idea of free speech ... in theory.http://readwrite.com/2015/01/13/apple-app-charlie-hebdo-mark-fiore-cartoons
http://readwrite.com/2015/01/13/apple-app-charlie-hebdo-mark-fiore-cartoonsMobileTue, 13 Jan 2015 13:20:02 -0800Helen A.S. PopkinCartoon: Okay, So One iPhone Prediction Was A Little Off<!-- tml-version="2" --><div tml-image="ci01b2fa32b0038266" tml-render-position="center" tml-render-size="large"><figure><img src="http://a4.files.readwrite.com/image/upload/c_fill,cs_srgb,w_620/MTIyNDM1MjM0NDI2ODE1MDc4.png" /></figure></div><p><em>See more of Rob's cartoons at&nbsp;<a href="http://robcottingham.ca/cartoon">Noise to Signal</a>.</em></p>See more of Rob's cartoons at Noise to Signal.http://readwrite.com/2012/09/13/cartoon-okay-so-one-iphone-prediction-was-a-little-off
http://readwrite.com/2012/09/13/cartoon-okay-so-one-iphone-prediction-was-a-little-offPlayThu, 13 Sep 2012 04:00:00 -0700Rob CottinghamCartoon: Runtime Error<!-- tml-version="2" --><div tml-image="ci01b2f9bf70006d19" tml-render-position="center" tml-render-size="large"><figure><img src="http://a2.files.readwrite.com/image/upload/c_fill,cs_srgb,w_620/MTIyNDM0NzM5MTYzNTg5OTEz.png" /></figure></div><p><em>See more of Rob's cartoons at&nbsp;<a href="http://robcottingham.ca/cartoon">Noise to Signal</a>.</em></p>See more of Rob's cartoons at Noise to Signal.http://readwrite.com/2012/09/07/cartoon-runtime-error
http://readwrite.com/2012/09/07/cartoon-runtime-errorPlayFri, 07 Sep 2012 07:00:00 -0700Rob CottinghamCartoon: Lights, Cameras... User Testing!<!-- tml-version="2" --><div tml-image="ci01b2f9b410008266" tml-render-position="center" tml-render-size="large"><figure><img src="http://a4.files.readwrite.com/image/upload/c_fill,cs_srgb,w_620/MTIyNDM0NjkwMzA4MTQ1NzY2.png" /></figure></div><p><em>See more of Rob's cartoons at&nbsp;<a href="http://robcottingham.ca/cartoon">Noise to Signal</a>.</em></p>See more of Rob's cartoons at Noise to Signal.http://readwrite.com/2012/08/30/cartoon-lights-cameras-user-testing
http://readwrite.com/2012/08/30/cartoon-lights-cameras-user-testingPlayThu, 30 Aug 2012 04:00:00 -0700Rob CottinghamCartoon: Mars Needs Megapixels!<!-- tml-version="2" --><div tml-image="ci01b2fb5e80036d19" tml-render-position="center" tml-render-size="large"><figure><img src="http://a1.files.readwrite.com/image/upload/c_fill,cs_srgb,w_620/MTIyNDM2NTIyMTExNjk3NTEw.png" /></figure></div><p><em>See more of Rob's cartoons at&nbsp;<a href="http://robcottingham.ca/cartoon">Noise to Signal</a>.</em></p>See more of Rob's cartoons at Noise to Signal.http://readwrite.com/2012/08/24/cartoon-mars-needs-megapixels
http://readwrite.com/2012/08/24/cartoon-mars-needs-megapixelsPlayFri, 24 Aug 2012 05:00:00 -0700Rob CottinghamCartoon: Certified!<!-- tml-version="2" --><div tml-image="ci01b2f938b0026d19" tml-render-position="center" tml-render-size="large"><figure><img src="http://a5.files.readwrite.com/image/upload/c_fill,cs_srgb,w_620/MTIyNDM0MTYwNjg0OTg1NjI1.png" /></figure></div>http://readwrite.com/2012/08/10/cartoon-certified
http://readwrite.com/2012/08/10/cartoon-certifiedPlayFri, 10 Aug 2012 11:43:47 -0700Rob CottinghamCartoon: The iPad Is Ready for Working by Hand<!-- tml-version="2" --><div tml-image="ci01b2fb4180026d19" tml-render-position="center" tml-render-size="large"><figure><img src="http://a3.files.readwrite.com/image/upload/c_fill,cs_srgb,dpr_1.0,q_80,w_620/MTIyNDM2Mzk3Mjg5MjA1MDE3.jpg" /></figure></div><p>A few months ago, Jon Mitchell <a href="http://www.readwriteweb.com/archives/the_ipad_isnt_ready_for_working_by_hand.php">wrote a great piece</a> that stirred up a lot of discussion about the viability of creating art on tablets with your hands. Although I commented at the time, I've finally drawn a more complete response.</p><p><a href="http://www.readwriteweb.com/files/cartoon_ipad_ready_for_working_by_hand_full.png"><em>Click for full-sized image.</em></a></p><p></p><div tml-image="ci01b2fb41e0016d19"><figure><img src="http://a2.files.readwrite.com/image/upload/c_fill,cs_srgb,dpr_1.0,q_80,w_620/MTIyNDM2Mzk4ODk5ODE3NzUz.jpg" /></figure></div>A few months ago, Jon Mitchell wrote a great piece that stirred up a lot of discussion about the viability of creating art on tablets with your hands. Although I commented at the time, I've finally drawn a more complete response.http://readwrite.com/2012/08/01/cartoon-the-ipad-is-ready-for-working-by-hand
http://readwrite.com/2012/08/01/cartoon-the-ipad-is-ready-for-working-by-handPlayWed, 01 Aug 2012 06:00:00 -0700Rob Cottingham[Cartoon] Last Place in the Hacker Olympics <!-- tml-version="2" --><p>Bad software developers, like bad athletes, have bad habits. And that can be a whole lot of bad. Do you copy and paste someone else’s code into your designs? Or maybe you spend all night debugging bad code that should have been more carefully written in the first place. The cartoon below, courtesy of the software analysis firm <a href="http://blog.castsoftware.com/">CAST</a>, campares athletes who finish last with developers who can't resist a shortcut to failure.&nbsp;</p><p></p><div tml-image="ci01b2f96b90016d19"><figure><img src="http://a4.files.readwrite.com/image/upload/c_fill,cs_srgb,dpr_1.0,q_80,w_620/MTIyNDM0Mzc4Mzg2MjA1OTc3.jpg" /></figure></div>Bad software developers, like bad athletes, have bad habits. And that can be a whole lot of bad. Do you copy and paste someone else’s code into your designs? Or maybe you spend all night debugging bad code that should have been more carefully written in the first place. The cartoon below, courtesy of the software analysis firm CAST, campares…http://readwrite.com/2012/07/25/cartoon-last-place-in-the-hacker-olympics
http://readwrite.com/2012/07/25/cartoon-last-place-in-the-hacker-olympicsHackWed, 25 Jul 2012 11:30:00 -0700Dan RowinskiCartoon: A Thief in the Night <!-- tml-version="2" --><div tml-image="ci01b2fa37b0016d19" tml-render-position="center" tml-render-size="large"><figure><img src="http://a2.files.readwrite.com/image/upload/c_fill,cs_srgb,dpr_1.0,q_80,w_620/MTIyNDM1MjU1OTAxNjUxNTU4.jpg" /></figure></div><p><em>See more of Rob's cartoons at&nbsp;<a href="http://robcottingham.ca/cartoon">Noise to Signal</a>.</em></p>See more of Rob's cartoons at Noise to Signal.http://readwrite.com/2012/07/18/cartoon-a-thief-in-the-night
http://readwrite.com/2012/07/18/cartoon-a-thief-in-the-nightPlayWed, 18 Jul 2012 05:00:00 -0700Rob Cottingham